How "Mature" Are Your Organization's Talent Management Processes?

Many organizations we engage with view Talent Management like it's some kind of exotic new discipline. The reality is that the functions usually associated with Talent Management (Recruitment, Performance Management, Learning and Development, Career Planning, Workforce Planning, Succession Management, Compensation) have been around for a long time. New technologies are allowing organizations to tie all these processes together and get true visibility into the business impacts of these functions.

We can usually tell how "grown up" our client's are by asking some key questions around the following areas for each of their Talent Management processes:

• What are the business drivers of the process? We're often met with a blank stare here.

• How frequently do you perform the process? Once per year or is it a constant, ongoing process?

• How standardized is the process across your organization?

• What kind of visibility does the process provide into key measures and organizational trends?

• Who owns the process? HR or the business - or both?

• What technologies support the process? Technology is an enabler of increased standardization, visibility, and process integration

• How integrated is the process with other talent management processes?

• What metrics do you use to measure the effectiveness and business impacts of your process? Often, another blank stare here.

Obviously, in depth analysis is required to determine how to improve your organization's processes. But by asking key questions you can learn quite a bit about where your organization is now, and where you want it to be in 1, 3, 5 or 10 years.

So what is your organization? Toddler? Kindergartener? Adolescent? Adult?

At Knowledge Infusion, we are constantly expanding our individual and collective knowledge of the Human Capital Management and Talent Management domains. Information comes through a variety of channels including this recommendation from one of our clients.

The book is titled "Results" by Gary Neilson and Bruce Pasternack. I haven't read it all, but have focused on a chapter titled "The Resilient Organization". The content is interesting to me because it speaks to the same mantra that Knowledge Infusion does on the importance of vision, alignment, adaptability, and moving the goalpost every three years.

Some excerpts:

"Flexible enough to adapt quickly to external market shifts, the Resilient organization remains steadfastly focused on and aligned behind coherent business strategy......Resilient is the healthiest of all organization types (compared to the Passive-Aggressive, the Fits and Starts, the Outgrown, the Over-managed, the Just In Time, and the Military Precision organizations). It is in good working order... They're always scanning the horizon for the next competitive battle or market innovation."

"Nothing exists "just because" in the Resilient organization; every position, process, and policy has a purpose...and that purpose is aligned with the strategic objectives of the enterprise." (Reminds me of Knowledge Infusion's trilogy of People, Process, and Technology).

This just scratches the surface...might be worth a read for you as well!!

Contributed by David Barron ? david.barron@knowledge-infusion.com, Principal Consultant, Knowledge Infusion

In this installment, we will continue to investigate the six steps that I believe will lead companies to value in their software selections. The six steps are:

1. Define Desired Business Outcomes

2. Define the Decision Criteria

3. Assess the Potential Providers

4. Engage the Providers

5. Conduct Software Demonstrations

6. Selection

Fifth step ? Conduct Software Demonstrations

Now comes the part you have been waiting on for so long, the software demonstration. I know it has been a long process and its fun seeing new capabilities, but now is not the time to lose focus. Everyone on the team needs to keep those well thought out decision criteria in mind while looking at the bells and whistles that the providers will invariably show you. Don?t get distracted by the show, focus on the content.

Some steps that we use at Knowledge Infusion (thanks Mike Brennan) to keep our heads in the game are:

? Conduct pre-demo briefings. Set the context prior to face-to-face provider introductions by covering relevant highlights from any documentation provided as well as from any third party sources you have leveraged.

? Focus on the product capability that matters to you. Develop a high-level scorecard for the audience to use as a means to compare each provider using the business requirements you have documented as section headers. This will focus their attention to the value delivered for each business objective. Avoid overly detailed score sheets that tend to be completely ignored or too much of a distraction from the demonstration itself to be useful.

? Ask them to show you. Follow the scenarios in process flow order to get the feel of a fully implemented product. When asking a question of the salesperson or engineer leading the demonstration, encourage them not to tell you how something works, but to show you. For any particular capability that requires exorbitant setup time, make a note to follow up with the provider for a remote demonstration.

? Ask questions. This is your time for everyone on the selection team ? from IT to functional experts - to understand how well each provider will satisfy your organization?s needs for years to come.

? Close the loop. Post-demo briefings after each demonstration offer collective insight through gut reactions.

Some final tips and things to think about when it comes to demonstrations:

Make sure the provider is showing the latest generally available software. The providers are very anxious to show you everything you asked for and sometimes that means they may have to show some prototype or ?demoware? that is still in development. Just make sure you know what to expect when the software is shipped.

Not all presenters are equal. Some will be good and some not so good. When that happens, it is not as easy to see the benefits of the software. Stay focused on the scenarios and not the speaker.

Not all organizations will fit the exact way a software package has been designed. So, try to determine those areas that you know will have to be customized. Keep in mind that every customization will have a cost in both dollars and time.

Enjoy the demo. In the next installment we will talk about the selection.

Next Installment ? Selection

During a recent client engagement focused on the project kick-off for the implementation of a compensation administration application, I found myself in a room with several HR Generalists having a good laugh about the 'Peanut Butter' approach to merit increases. As the conversation went on, those in the room even made funny hand motions simulating the 'spreading' of a 4% merit budget across a line of business. The concept of differentiation was a hot point that provoked sheer cackling laughter from the group.

This scene is likely not too uncommon for most companies as they approach the merit planning season. The 'Peanut Butter' approach seems to be the norm with few companies mastering differentiation and true pay-for-performance. This begs the question why planning managers find it so difficult to differentiate performance and reward based on that differentiation? Is HR failing in getting the concept across and building the necessary tools and means to make it a reality? Is this message falling on deaf ears?

As organizations work to build a pay-for-performance strategy and enable it with technology, they need to remember to take into account the critical component of manager development in their efforts. It's not enough to state a pay-for-performance philosophy and publish salary increase guidelines to support it. Managers need development opportunities on how to manage performance and how to have difficult conversations with under performing employees and how to take the necessary steps to correct that performance or work those individuals out of the organization. Merit can be and should be a means to incent and retain true contributors in the organization. True differentiation won't be possible until managers are enabled to do the critical work beyond filling out the spreadsheet.